


did you know?

by ttamarrindo



Category: Day6 (Band)
Genre: Canon Compliant, I mean I guess?, Loneliness, M/M, Reincarnation, the moon & the sun and & all it involves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-01
Updated: 2017-12-01
Packaged: 2019-02-09 00:01:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12875865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ttamarrindo/pseuds/ttamarrindo
Summary: the moon happens to wish upon a falling star.(alt: younghyun doesn't remember and jae can't forget.)





	did you know?

**Author's Note:**

> there's so much i want to say about this one but it wouldn't be fair to say it here so just 1. this walks a thin line i've never walked before so, be gentle? 2. this style is not for everyone (i don't know yet if it's for me but i needed to at least try) but for those of you who do Get It, thank you, it means more than words can say 3. moonrise seems like such a fitting not-end i thought i'd try to write something about it - so something to that effect. 4. i realize now that this is also for you three bc things are changing and that's always scary. if you happen to read this then just know i won't forget.

did you know? the sun and the moon used to be friends. 

+

it’s the third time they’ve been told to wait. by now, all their reasons are starting to sound too much like excuses.

“do you think we’ll ever make it?” it’s wonpil who speaks first, long after manager-nim has left. _you’re just not ready yet_ s and _maybe next time_ s hang heavy and sour between them, make it hard to look each other in the eye because the only one who ever comes out the winner of the blaming game is disappointment and they know that right now staying together is best if not enough. 

jaehyung who once was something much more bigger than the two syllables of his name and this frail human heart that beats beats beats painfully in his chest can’t help but look at younghyun and think: _this_ is what you wanted? 

“we will,” sungjin says, not as sure as it should have sounded. “we’ll debut. someday.” 

“someday,” dowoon repeats, means what they all know but don’t say; that the distance between today and someday is still too much too long not now. 

jaehyung looks at younghyun who once was something much more bigger than the bitter weight of disappointment riding on his shoulders but still (always always) wanted more and thinks: is this really worth the pain?

and he knows, without having to ask aloud, that the answer remains the same.

+

friendship born out of loneliness is still friendship. 

+

the sun was is will be always there. he is a fixture, he is the center, and therefore a small infinite in and of himself. but what no one ever tells you about little infinities is that life without company looks an awful lot like dying. and so on one of many lonely days the sun turns towards the sky and asks for company. 

gets the night in return. gets the moon. 

the moon, who knows nothing when he first arrives, is confused and a bit lost but that’s okay. he’s okay. the sun teaches him how to listen to starsongs at night and how to go around and around like the sun has watched the earth do countless times before.

for a while, they are okay. for a while, they are both Not Alone. not yet Together but close and getting closer. 

then, the first mistake. the moon asks: is this all there is?

and the sun who has only ever asked for someone to stay a while answers: well... yes. thinks but doesn’t say: is it not enough? means even more: am i not enough?

knows without really knowing why that someday he won’t be. 

+

the moon likes to play pretend. 

he watches the earth and the million lives it holds, watches them flicker out flicker in and thinks: wouldn’t that be nice.

the sun worries because he knows what loneliness feels like and he does not want to feel it again. says to the moon _it’s not worth it. they all die in the end, so what’s the point of it all?_. 

the moon doesn’t know what the point is nor why it seems to hold so much weight for the sun who is Meaning all by himself so he doesn’t answer, stays silent. still, he thinks. 

wouldn’t that be nice. 

+

stars fall because that’s what stars are meant to do. sometimes when they hit the earth they are no longer stars but wishes instead and sometimes those wishes become realities but only sometimes. 

the moon happens to wish upon a falling star. his wish: something like _take me with you_ and i’m sorry all at once.

the star falls because that’s what stars are meant to do. and the moon-

falls with. 

+

“hi. i’m - i’m younghyun. it’s nice to meet you.” 

jae stares at the boy standing before him and sees not a boy but something much bigger much more his. he stares long enough for it to get awkward because the boy who is not just a boy but also a memory also a friend shuffles on his feet and ducks his head. 

“jaehyung,” the sun says and takes the moon’s hand. “nice to meet you too.”

means: found you. 

+

the stars like to sing the story of the first beginning. they sing about the selfish moon who gave everything up everything away and fell down to the earth as if he were one of them. they sing about how the sun cried cried cried and how his tears were drops shaped like _come back_ and _please_ and _i’m sorry i wasn’t enough_. 

the stars sing to the sky at night and the sky at morning too because now that the moon is gone maybe he’ll walk in daylight too. so they sing and hope that the moon will listen. 

hope he’ll remember. 

+

after the moon falls the sun learns that there are different types of loneliness and also that this one has to be, by far, the worst. 

because the sun is what he is but most importantly who he is, he has found a way to measure time so that _too long_ can be cut down into smaller pieces of waiting and he’ll be able to keep on Being. people down on earth count seconds count minutes count hours and days and months and years. in a word: they count in numbers and all those numbers will always look at the sun for direction. the sun however does not count in numbers, finds them meaningless and all together not enough. 

the sun counts like this: moments with you and moments without. 

(lately there seem to be more of the latter but the sun does not think too much about that because if he does then he’ll cry and who knows if he’ll be capable of stopping.)

the sun misses his moon more than he misses the day when the night comes to tell him it’s time to let go. _i’d give anything to see him again_ , the sun says and means it more than he probably should. _i’d give everything._

 _everything is too much_ , the stars whisper back but the sun thinks: no it isn’t. everything is all i know how to give.

+

stars fall because that’s what stars are meant to do. 

did you know? the sun is a star too. 

+

younghyun has always had trouble sleeping at night when it’s darker than dark. his mother used to tell him not to be afraid because darkest only meant that soon dawn would come and take it all away. younghyun didn’t say it then and he doesn’t say it know but the thing is this: he is not afraid. the dark before the dawn greets him like an old friend on the other side of the window and younghyun feels not afraid but something else altogether. something closer to regret and the feeling you get when you have forgotten something - someone - you really shouldn’t have. 

one of those sleepless night when the others are tucked away and hidden under layers of too tired too much too soon jaehyung wakes up and catches younghyun looking out of the window. 

their heating broke some weeks ago but management says there’s just a few days until spring which basically means: deal with it. so they deal. sungjin bought them a few blankets with some cash he had been saving up for a pair of nice new gloves but then again, what are two frozen hands to a frozen everything.

at least that’s what he said when they asked him _are you sure_ and they all pretended it was something nice to do instead of the big small thing underlined by _we are in this together_ and _i take care of you now_ that it really was. 

point being: the dorm is below zero. at least that’s what it feels like to younghyun who has his back against his bed and his side pressed against the window pane and his mind somewhere not here. 

“can’t sleep?” jae asks and if it comes out a bit choked then younghyun is either too kind to comment on it or far too gone to notice (which is bad but could ultimately be worse. younghyun does not remember now but that does not mean he won’t somewhere down the line and jae clings to hope like he used to cling to the sky and waits waits waits.) 

“not really,” younghyun answers and then, because he knows that’s not enough of an answer, adds, “i think i dream too much.”

jae cocks his head to the side, slips an arm under his chin so he can stare at younghyun stare at the night sky. something about it all is achingly familiar to younghyun who at this point knows nothing about the moon and the sun, not what they are now and most importantly what they were then. all he knows about them he learnt in school and then forgot about which can be summarised pretty simply: not nearly enough. 

“bad dreams?” jae asks, soft and quiet and all the other sounds the resemble silence but are not quite it. 

“no, i-” younghyun pauses. thinks. says, “i don’t know.” a shrug. honestly he doesn’t know. his dreams come in shapes of incomplete circles and a grey-colored longing that clouds his thoughts and itches under his skin. younghyun’s dreams are unsettling because they feel like memories not his own but still _him_ in a way if not as present. they are not bad but that doesn’t mean they are good either. 

“i don’t know,” is what he settles for. the most honest answer he can give. 

jae who is reminded of his moon who was also his center his heart his one regret, shrugs and murmurs, “go back to sleep. we have to get up early tomorrow,” and leaves it at that. 

“in a minute,” younghyun says. he turns back to the window and looks at seoul pulsing with life, the sky so bright with neon light it hides the stars from view and something in him aches. 

+

what younghyun said: i think i dream too much. 

what he didn’t say: somehow you’re in every single one of them. 

+

true: late is better than never.

also true: late can still hurt. 

+

they’re throwing names out into the open and hoping one will catch. sungjin’s patience runs thin thin thinner with every joke the maknae line cracks because he’s the leader and that means he carries words like Responsibility and Fault on his shoulders and sometimes words feel far heavier than they really are. they have a deadline but have also been given the opportunity to choose for themselves for once so it all evens out in the end. right now it doesn’t feel much like it. 

“what a about mayday?” wonpil chortles, says, “seems fitting for our first full album,” and then laughs at the unimpressed look sungjin sends his way. “too much?”

“doomsday then,” dowoon chips in and laughs free and unburned which is always nice coming from such a quiet boy like him but not always right. 

sungjin seems to think so too because he frowns at them and crosses his arms over his chest. “will you two stop messing around? seriously this is-”

then, quiet, younghyun offers, “what about sunrise?” and the living room grows silent - the thoughtful kind, not the bad kind - and there’s just the murmur of the tv wonpil left on to fill in the spaces words left behind. 

“i like it,” wonpil says after he’s turned it around in his head a few times, grins. “sunrise,” chews on the word. “i think it fits fine.” 

“me too,” dowoon agrees. sungjin nods his consent a few seconds later, seems satisfied though that may have more to do with the fact that now he has something to present to management than because he actually likes the name. not that it matters. 

“what do you think, hyung?”

there is a knot in jae’s throat that tightens and pulls with every seconds that passes because when younghyun said sunrise he also said _jaehyung_ also said _sorry_ even if he does not know it yet.

“sounds nice,” is jae’s answer, said through the cotton in his mouth. he looks at younghyun who in turn looks back, seems pleased if not a tiny bit lost. 

hope is a terrible terrible thing to offer but jae takes it anyways because when younghyun said sunrise he also said _we_ and all jae could think was: oh.

_do you remember me still?_

+

possibility; noun. described as: the state or fact of being likely or possible. pronounced as: _what-if_ and _maybe this time_ and _we could have been_. 

+

they are filming the individual teasers for I Smile and younghyun is the kind of tired that makes his shoulder slump down down down and the clang of the staff working around him echo louder than it should.

the others are happy or as close as you can get to the feeling when the pressure of a comeback is riding high. that is to say: actually pretty close. 

but younghyun is tired. he’s been sleeping less and working more and the few times he actually gets some time to rest he dreams not-bad dreams about a boy with daybreak across his smile and summer in his laugh and a pull like gravity to his voice. 

jae steps into the set, ready to film, and the backdrop of a watercolor sunrise flickers in behind him before younghyun can think much else. daylight spreads and stains in pink orange white and younghyun - younghyun thinks of a boy with daybreak in his smile and oddly: you look at lot like him. 

even odder: he looks a lot like you. 

+

once, jae burns his hand on the stove. he had been trying to heat up some ramyeon, miscalculates, and ends up with a red mark right in the middle of his palm for his troubles.

younghyun holds jae’s hand under the faucet soft soft softer still and chides him for being so careless, says not as exasperated as he had hoped but too fond instead, _it’s shitty ramyeon, how can you fuck that up?_. 

all jae does is laugh because when he was the sun and younghyun was the moon they never got to hold hands like this even when that was all the sun longed to do. jae thinks a small scar is a small price to pay if he gets to touch his moon’s hand and hold him close. 

younghyun’s hair is dyed silver but it looks almost white under the moonlight that filters in through the cracked window of their closet-sized kitchen. jae aches to card his fingers through it, thinks it would feel like starlight if he did. ultimately he doesn’t because he is not the sun even if he was and younghyun is not the moon even if he always will be. 

“be more careful next time,” younghyun says as he turns the tap off. the thing still leaks anyways and the drip drip drip of water hitting metal keeps time to the beat of jae’s heart as he says, “i’m sorry.”

means: for everything. 

+

the thing about the moon that is also a problem is this: he changes.

people call it the waxing crescent, the first quarter, the full moon, and so and and so forth. 

the sun calls it loneliness. 

there are times when the moon is not there at all and the sun does his best not to cry and wait for him to come back again but it’s hard because loneliness is always worst when you have something to compare it to and the sun has learned what it’s like to be Together and Not Alone and to him it all means the same means: 

with you. 

and so every time the moon dies the sun can’t help but ask him: how longer do i have to chase you?

and the moon, as always, answers: just one more day. 

+

everyday.

+

sometimes the sun blames himself which is an awful terrible feeling to have when you remember being something else than human.

sometimes when things don’t go their way when a song sounds not quite right and the bad thought they all share sounds like _is this enough? are we enough?_ the sun blames himself and it hurts.

being human is the hardest thing the sun has ever done, thinks that for many people it must feel the same. thinks when he looks at younghyun: it would be for you too if only you could remember. 

if only you could remember me.

+

not remembering does not mean forgetting.

+

younghyun’s dreams are getting worse and worse which means in a few chosen words: they do not feel like dreams at all. 

younghyun remembers the nothing that came before the Something and he also remembers that Something meant a boy with warmth in his eyes and laughter in his steps whose sorrow seemed like the lightest of weights but was not, was in fact leaden was in fact-

because of him.

the moon has memories but those memories come with a scratch of guilt because maybe he was selfish, selfish when he wished for more and selfish when he fell but wasn’t the sun selfish too? he was lonely so he asked for someone even if that someone didn’t want to Be. didn’t want to and wanted too much. all at the same time. 

but what’s done is done. there is no going back. the moon is not the moon is instead a boy who never outgrew his childhood dream and now breathes lives dies for music. 

the moon does not remember. 

but he does not forget either. 

+

this time when manager-nim calls and says, “we need a name for the next album,” there is no question no hesitation when jae answers, “moonrise. let’s call it moonrise.”

the moon looks at jaehyung and thinks for a moment that he sees something else something bigger-

something his. 

+

“do you think we’ve met before? in another life?”

jae blinks. he has an answer but he also knows it won’t go well if said aloud. he looks at younghyun who is not staring at him but at his phone where their twitter account lies open on the screen and the teasers photos for moonrise flash back at him like a bitter reminder. the backlight of his phone lights up his face and creates shadows creates memories. jae looks away. 

“i don’t think so,” he says. “i think i would remember you if i had met you before.” 

younghyun sets his phone down because that’s a more honest answer than he was expecting. he didn’t really know what he was expecting in the first place frankly but this - the open, almost unguarded look on jae’s face - was not it. 

“i think i would too,” he answers, looks at his photo again. his face is covered in shades of blue, looks like the life of a moon and looks right but that can’t be. 

jae laughs and it is a brittle sound that has no edge of amusement to it, makes younghyun’s hair stand on end.

younghyun looks at the photo again, thinks: it can’t be.

+

right?

+

the moon’s first choice: wishing for more.

the sun’s first regret: letting him go.

+

is it though?

sometimes the sun will look at the moon when he is not the moon but just younghyun who is also a musician also a performer also energy on stage. the sun watches him smile and play song after song after song and thinks: you never shined this bright when we were up there. 

+

can you regret something that still hasn’t come to pass? 

+

they are walking down the streets long after night has fallen and the lamplights look like far-away stars look like home. 

jae stares at younghyun as they walk and resists the urge to brush his fingers against the moon’s own. now that they have been given hands meant for holding and lips meant for kissing the sun finds that he still can’t do neither. he thinks it’s unfair but also fitting in a sense. the moon orbits the earth not the sun and so jae finds it right that he’d be the one to long and to chase. 

there is a balance they must not break. jae doesn’t know what will happen when they die - _if_ they die. will they return up where they belong or will they live again and again just like the moon becomes new becomes full becomes again? 

he doesn’t know. for now he is willing to wait and see where they end up. 

as long as they are together they’ll be fine. 

just fine. 

+

did you know? every beginning has an ending. 

+

they are not prepared when the host calls out their name. not nearly ready when they usher them all up to the stage and sungjin stumbles through his acceptance speech. thanks their company their managers their stylists and finally thanks the five of them too. 

jae feels at tug at his sleeve, just barely manages to catch a glimpse of wonpil’s beaming smile before he is pushed into a group hug that feels an awful lot like _we made it_ and even more so _this is us_. 

the sun has never had a family before, has only ever had the moon and now even he doesn’t remember him, but here, with wonpil’s arm around his waist and dowoon’s choked down laughter in his ear and sungjin’s chest at his back he thinks: maybe this is it. hopes that it is but doesn’t really care if it isn’t because right now the sun is strangely-

happy. 

+

back at their dorm after the rest have crashed or gone to sleep peacefully or anything in the in-between the sun stands with his back facing their messy living room and his view facing the sky. it is late at this hour, so much so that it’s almost early which means the sky is at its darkest. 

younghyun comes to stand with him and there is a happiness in him too. the sun thinks about falling and then surprises himself by thinking: it wasn’t so bad. 

at least i fell with you. 

the moon who is still not his moon but is still _his_ even when he’s a boy called younghyun also called friend called family called happiness and maybe something more turns to look at the sun who will always be the sun but is also just jaehyung and that’s enough. he’s enough. 

“we did it,” younghyun breathes, laughs disbelievingly. “we won.”

“we did,” jaehyung answers with a mile that has daybreak painted across it. “worth all the pain.”

younghyun snorts which is something entirely human but also entirely him. something jaehyung is starting to understand is also enough. “it was,” he says. “worth it all.” and takes the sun’s hands in his. 

yes, the sun thinks just as the night starts to break into pieces and the sky bleeds soft color around the curve of the earth. yes it was. 

+

did you know? there are some things worth falling for.

**Author's Note:**

> someday i'll write something worth reading/ till then well, let's call this the first try. thank you to everyone who made it this far i hope it didn't disappoint that much? also come say hi if you want: [tumblr](https://jahehyung.tumblr.com/)/ [cc](https://curiouscat.me/ttamarrindo) and as always anything you leave behind is welcomed and more than appreciated <3


End file.
